A Noble Combat

The Letters of Shiela Grant Duff and Adam von Trott zu Solz 1932-1939

Edited by Klemens von Klemperer

One of the most eloquent and moving correspondences of the 20th century, the letters that passed between Shiela Grant Duff and Adam von Trott zu Solz tell of a friendship--tender, strained, and finally tragic--between a young Englishwoman, who became a distinguished foreign correspondent in the 1930s, and a German Rhodes Scholar, who eventually joined the resistance against Hitler and was executed by the Nazis after the abortive coup of 1944. The letters begin at Oxford--where Shiela and Adam moved in a circle of friends who shared fervent dreams of social justice and a new Europe--and continue to the eve of war, when their relationship shattered under the pressures of their own temperaments and the mounting European crisis. Graceful and evocative, these letters
paint an intimate portrait of a troubled generation of young, cosmopolitan, and politically committed intelligentsia in the 1930s and give us a lasting record of the social world and political tensions of the era before the Second World War.

A Noble Combat

The Letters of Shiela Grant Duff and Adam von Trott zu Solz 1932-1939

Edited by Klemens von Klemperer

Description

One of the most eloquent and moving correspondences of the twentieth century, the letters that passed between Shiela Grant Duff and Adam von Trott zu Solz tell of a friendship--tender, strained, and finally tragic--between a young Englishwoman, who became a distinguished foreign correspondent in the 1930s, and a German Rhodes Scholar, who eventually joined the resistance against Hitler and was executed by the Nazis after the abortive coup of 1944. The letters begin at Oxford, where Shiela and Adam moved in a circle of friends that shared fervent dreams of social justice and a new Europe. The story continues to the eve of war, when their relationship shattered under the pressures of their own temperaments and the mounting European crisis. Graceful and evocative,
these letters paint an intimate portrait of a troubled generation of young, cosmopolitan, and politically committed intelligentsia in the 1930s and give us a lasting record of the social world and political tensions of the era before the Second World War.

The Letters of Shiela Grant Duff and Adam von Trott zu Solz 1932-1939

Edited by Klemens von Klemperer

Reviews and Awards

"Intensely interesting....[This] collection of letters exchanged between Trott and his Oxford friend, Shiela Grant Duff, who worked as a foreign correspondent before the war....record how politics divided two idealists who had set out to create a model friendship. Each was a little in love with the other, but not enough. Both believed at first in 'the fundamental integrity of Europe.' Events forced them apart."